The World Steel Association (worldsteel) says that global crude steel output from its 66 reporting countries was 145.3 million tonnes in October 2017, up 5.9% year-on-year. Capacity utilisation within the reporting countries also rose y-o-y again during the month, but dipped slightly compared to September 2017.

China produced 72.4mt in the month, an increase of 6.1% on October 2016 and now represents just under half of the world’s crude steel output at 49.8%. In November the local Chinese authorities have begun to implement industrial output restrictions for the winter season and this is likely to impact crude steel output figures in the coming months.

In the EU28 total October crude steel production grew by 3.4% y-on-y to 14.7mt. Estimated output in Germany grew on-year by 2.7% to 3.6mt. Monthly output in Italy grew fairly strongly y-o-y by 6.1% to 2.3mt. French crude steel output rose on-year in October by 1.6% to just under 1.4mt. Spanish output grew sharply by 11.9% y-o-y to 1.3mt.